Coming Undone
by LetTheRadioBreakTheSilence
Summary: Tess one-shot. "You're losing it...the water's high, you're jumping into it and letting go...and no one knows that you cry, but you don't tell anyone that you might not be the golden one...and you're tied together with a smile, but you're coming undone."


**A/N: The lyrics I used in the summary are from "Tied Together With A Smile" by Taylor Swift, but this isn't a song-fic. REVIEW!  
**

"Why aren't you eating, Tess?" Peggy asked her, taking another bite of her spaghetti.

A better friend would have noticed that Tess had done nothing but pick at her meals all summer, smearing them around her plate with her utensils...that is, when she even went to the mess hall anymore, which was becoming an increasingly rare event. A better friend would have noticed that she always seemed to be "running late" in the morning so she had to skip breakfast. That she was always "exhausted" in the afternoon so she had to nap through lunch. That she always had "so much work to do" in the evening so she had to practice through dinner. That she was always tired, always weak. That she wasn't the same girl they had known the summer before, in any way.

But what she was most afraid of, really, was that they did notice…they just didn't care.

Everything was different this summer. Last year, she had been confident. Cocky, even. She'd been chasing after Shane, doing anything to get him. But this year, she had barely even noticed he was there. Last year, she was so determined to win the Final Jam, and she would do anything to make sure that she did.

God, the Final Jam. Everything had fallen apart for Tess, in that one moment. She finally realized what her "friends" really thought of her. She'd gotten them to at least talk to her again, but it wasn't the same. She knew that they still didn't really care about her. More important than her friends, however, she'd seen where she stood in her mother's eyes: second to her career. It was really a wake-up call for her. She wished she was stronger. That she could just brush it off. That she could just…not care. But she would never be the same again.

She'd lost so much weight since last summer's Final Jam. But still, nobody had asked her if she was okay. If she was eating enough. If she needed to talk. Would she have told them the truth? She didn't know, but it would have been nice to be asked the question. To know that someone had noticed, and that someone cared enough about her to ask. To just take a second out of their day, and ask her if she wanted to talk about anything.

Her hip bones stuck out. So did her shoulder blades. And her collar bones, and her cheek bones. If she ever wore tight clothes anymore, people would have noticed. They would have realized that she was so skinny they could easily count her ribs one-by-one. If they saw her legs, they would have said that they looked like they'd snap right in half if a strong gust of wind came along. But she was usually bundled up, because now even in the summer she still felt cold. On the rare occasion that she did wear something a little more revealing, they all just told her that she looked like a supermodel. If they only knew.

Maybe she'd started doing it for attention. Maybe it had just been a reaction to the loneliness she felt, or to the stress of living in her mother's larger-than-life shadow. She didn't even know anymore. She just knew that now, she was never hungry. She hated the way that food tasted. She hated the way it felt inside her body. She couldn't even stand the smell anymore. The only time she felt anything even close to okay was when her stomach was empty. Now, even when she did eat a little, she would feel terrible pain, which only made her want to starve more.

It wasn't about looking a certain way, or being a certain weight. It gave Tess something to control in a world that left her feeling so out-of-control. She took comfort in that. She could be forced to go to school, or camp, or piano lessons, or play rehearsal. She could be forced to do her homework, or visit her grandparents, or go to bed at a certain time. But no one could force her to eat anything she didn't want to. No one could force her to eat at all, if she didn't want to. It was up to her, and there was nothing anyone could do about it, even if they wanted to. Not that it mattered, because no one wanted to do anything about it. No one even noticed.

She was a different person this summer. She was quiet. She kept to herself. She was distant when people spoke to her. She rarely got onstage, a place she used to love – the only time she did anymore was when Brown chose her with "the finger," because then she didn't really have a choice. It was a struggle to get out of bed every morning, because she had nothing to look forward to. Her confidence was gone. She was sad, and lonely. She couldn't stand to look in the mirror, because she didn't recognize the person looking back at her anymore. Her eyes had lost their sparkle, and in its place was a look of utter despair. A look of complete and total misery. But it didn't seem to her that anyone else could see it.

She wondered what others saw when they looked at her, because all she could see was a lost little girl, screaming for someone to save her. That's how she felt most of the time, like she was screaming. The kind of scream that enters your ears, rattles your brain, and shakes your soul. The kind that makes your skin crawl, and your hair stand straight up on end. But it was a silent scream, and she was the only one who could hear it.

She just wanted someone to notice. Her mother, her friends, her instructors…anyone. She wanted someone to notice that behind the pretty face, the make-up, and the forced smile, she was in trouble. She couldn't make it much longer. She was dying inside. Dying…that seemed less scary to her every single day. She just wanted someone to notice before it was too late. Before that thought didn't scare her at all. Before it consumed her.

But no one noticed, and so she'd just continue on this way. Wasting away.

Tess shrugged, not even bothering to look up at Peggy. "I'm just not hungry, I guess."

Eventually, she would disappear. She wondered if anyone would even notice.


End file.
